kāore ahau e mōhio
in the end,
we are all going to die, s o m e d a y.
why accelerate this inevitable
via senseless wars?
why wreck lives
in pursuit of political prowess?
why eradicate environments
with overblown munition?
this psychopathy
perplexes me,
unravels me.
I have no prehension
as to why
we extirpate
ourselves.
ko wai e kōrero mai he aha ai?
nō te mea
kāore ahau e mōhio -
i roto i tētahi reo.
[Translations from te reo Māori to English –
kāore ahau e mōhio – I do not know
ko wai e kōrero mai he aha ai? - who can tell me why?
nō te mea – because
i roto i tētahi reo – in any language]
Vaughan Rapatahana (Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Te Whiti) commutes between homes in Hong Kong, Philippines, and Aotearoa New Zealand. He is widely published across several genre in both his main languages, te reo Māori and English and his work has been translated into Bahasa Malaysia, Italian, French, Mandarin, Romanian, Spanish, Esperanto. He is the author and editor/co-editor of over 50 books. He won the AAALS Indigenous Poetry Prize in 2026. New Zealand Book Council Writers File is https://www.read-nz.org/writer/rapatahana-vaughan/
